The compositional principles in most of the pictorial works that
we see in art museums and everyday life feel so natural to us we
hardly realize their existence. In reality they are an outcome of
more than half a century long discussion on the relation between a
work of art and the real world and represent one of the key themes
of the European tradition in art and thought.
The exhibition is dedicated to the problem of perspective in art across styles and historical epochs, with an accent on modern and contemporary art. It sets out to show works of various stylistic and formal character, with the common denominator of applying the principles of perspective for constructing the depth of the picture and an illusion of space. On examples of roughly ninety exhibits (prints, paintings, drawings, photographs) from the workshops of Czech artists it will present a multitude of different types of perspective compositions making it easier for the visitors to get a grasp on the relationship between artistic traditions and the present. The visitors will become acquainted with compositional stereotypes in works of art and their sources and attempts at experimenting with the principles of composition.
Throughout the history of art the examination of spatial illusory depiction attained various levels of intensity and led to varying results depending on the nature and function of a particular work of art.
The scope of the possible solutions presented at the exhibition spans the
conventional adoption of some formal elements to examples where the basic principles of perspective become the point of departure for visual experiments as can be seen in the minimalist and geometrically oriented works from the 1960s and 1970s. The core of the selection consists of "found" simple applications of linear perspective, illustrated mainly on works from the collections of the Moravian Gallery in Brno and other institutions, and also the presentation of modern and contemporary artists, for whom the study of spatial relationships turned into a pivotal theme
of their work.